The proposed research calls for the synthetic investigation of a diversion project for deliquent youth using various volunteer personpower groups as change agents. A four year program of research is outlined. The initial two years will experimentally examine the role of high intensity versus low intensity of training and supervision of the volunteers, high versus low previous involvement in the justice system, and the relative importance of the characteristics of the change agents per se. The third and fourth years call for implanting the model diversion project in two additional communities to examine the role of social setting variables in contributing to successful outcome. All four years of research include a focus on individual, group, and systemic variables and interventions. The intervention modality to be used with diverted youth will involve a combined behavioral contracting-child advocacy appoach focusing in specific interpersonal contingencies, skills training, and community resource generation and stimulation. The overall goal of the project is to develop empirically validated models for diverting apprehended youth which demonstrate maximum effectiveness, are of sufficient specificity to allow transfer to existing community groups, and are relatively inexpensive.